How to make bread in five minutes a day?

Rosemary Crescent Rolls

If you start with a bucket of the Master recipe you can quickly and easily created these tasty, crusty, rosemary crescent rolls. This technique is an easy way to incorporate flavors into the dough without fuss. Shape matters; everything seems to taste better when it looks great and these crescent rolls are adorable. My boys claim to have a certain disdain for the strong flavor of rosemary and yet they ate the entire batch of these rolls when they got home from school, never realizing they were stuffed with the dreaded herb. Oh, the tricks we parents play to get our kids to be more adventuresome eaters. At least this one is fast and easy, as well as delicious! Next time I try it with spinach. 😉

Rosemary Crescent Rolls:

1 pound Master Recipe (ABin5 or HBin5) or Olive Oil Dough, actually any dough will work, but you’ll need to change the baking temperature to match the dough.

2 tablespoons finely chopped rosemary or other herbs

3 tablespoons olive oil

Salt for sprinkling on the dough

To make the crescent rolls:

prepare two baking sheets with oil or parchment.

Roll the dough out to a 1/4-inch thick round. Divide the round into 16 equal pieced using a Pizza Cutter.

Using a Pastry Brush, paint the dough with olive oil and then sprinkle with the rosemary and salt.

Gently stretch the dough to elongate the piece.

Lay the piece back down and stretch out the wide end of the dough.

Start rolling the dough from that wide end,

tightly, until you reach the point.

Lay the crescent rolls out onto the prepared pans, with the point tucked under the rolls. Allow to rest for about 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 475°F. This is slightly higher than you would bake the same dough as a big boule, so that we will get nice color on the rolls quickly. No steam or stone is necessary.

The rolls will not have risen much, but will be slightly puffy looking. Paint with more olive oil and bake for about 25 minutes, switching the pans from top to bottom and back to front about half way through the baking.

I have a boule of bread in baking as I write this. I love this bread. I can’t believe it is so effortless, yet so good. I love rosemary bread. Am excited to try these. I have 2 lbs of dough left. That just may be my next batch of wonderful bread. Thanks for your time and efforts and most of all for sharing them.

Awesome! Perfect for the wild rosemary that grows all over my new yard! AND that I can do it in an oven without steam is a huge bonus too! Looks like something to make for the kids to take to “Breaking Bread Day” at school! THANKS, dear friend! Looks awesome! xoxo J

Beautiful! I wish the screen can come to life! I made whole wheat Brioche dough few days ago….and I loved the texture so much, its going to be “best” for buns, and dinner rolls. Its much softer, sweeter even for cold sandwiches. I bet the rolls would rock using the same dough…I cant wait!

Hi Jeff & Zoe,
I was baking this rolls last night and only 9 min. everything turn brown and almost burned… 🙁
I was using Master Recipe from HBi5 and follow the step to use 475°F, guess that’s too high…
What temperature I should use?
Thank you
Judy

I tried this fantastic-looking recipe with Olive Oil dough (ABin5) and followed the temperature (475°F) as well as the baking time (25 min), are you sure about both? As Judy said, I also think its too high and too long, the result was rather hard and too brown to really enjoy. Are they supposed to be that crispy?

I have ABI5MD and HBI5MD books and have tried the plain Master Bread recipe three times but my loaf flattens on bench rise. I think the problem may be Australian measuring cup and tablespoon size. Have read the conversion charts on p36 (1 cup water is 225g) & p37 (1 cup liquid is 240ml which is equivalent to 240g). Have also checked the blogs. Can you please measure all ingredients used for the Master Recipe and provide gram weight for all. I really would like to make this bread successfully, before moving on to other recipes in the book(s).

Donna: Go to the search box near the top of the window and type in the word “Greek.” The second listing has what you want. But much more on this in our third book out in about 4 weeks. May want to roll it even thinner than that, closer to 1/4 inch thick. And dock (puncture) it well. Jeff

I know this doesn’t have anything to do with this particular recipe, really, but I recently came up with a way of getting a nice crispy crust when your oven doesn’t have a good seal that I wanted to share.

I was having a hard time getting a really crispy crust, but I never went and bought a spray bottle, because I’m lazy like that. Which is why I make 5 minute a day bread instead of my grandmother’s recipe. I pour in the water like you suggest, and then after 5 minutes, throw in about four ice cubes (just right down on the bottom of the oven), and then two minutes later, throw in a few more. It steams up beautifully, and makes a nice crispy crust!

Hi Jeff and/or Zoe, My question is regarding the apple and honey Challah in your Healthy Breads in 5 book. I made the dough and it seemed to be pretty wet (I am experienced at using this process and your recipes). I added a bit more flour than called for–maybe 1/2 to 3/4 cup more. The pan was filled after the 2 hours and I put it in the refrigerator. It oozed over the sides and made a huge mess in my refrig. (reminiscent of the book: The Dutchess Bakes a Cake by Viriginia Kahl). I’m hoping the dough will be stiff enough to roll for my Challah on Wed. Any suggestions? What did I do wrong? I followed the recipe exactly. Thanks for any advice!

The pan i eas referring to is a stainless steel restaurant
tub that i always keep my doughh in, in the refrigerator. It overflowed. There seemed like more dough than with other recipes and so many apples! I just hope I can shape it tomorrow.

Linda: You should be fine, just use lots of dusting flour as you shape. I assume you will be doing this as a turban-shape or just a round ball for the occasion, which will be easier to deal with than braids.

I don’t have an immediate explanation for why you seem to have so much more dough than usual. Jeff

Thanks, Jeff. It did require more flour and liquid than the other recipes, and wheat germ does make batters more “liquidy”, so that may explain it. If I can’t get it shaped, I’ll put it in a round cake pan and that will be that.

I just tried the crescent rolls with the master recipe. I used pesto instead of rosemary and olive oil. However, all the rolls stuck to the parchment paper and I thought they were a bit tough. I have to say I was disappointed.

Barbara: Because we love breaking traditions, we did say that you could use either the (lean) Master Recipe or the (enriched) olive oil dough, but… traditional crescent rolls are made with enriched dough, not the Master Recipe you tried. Lean dough gives a much firmer result than what you’re used to in a crescent roll– yes, compared with an enriched dough, this will seem “tough” (though I’d describe them as firm bread-like rather than soft enriched-roll like). Try it with an enriched dough like the Olive Oil dough, or even Challah or Brioche, and see what you think.

Which of our books do you have– we can direct you to a better fit? Jeff

Hi Jeff,
Thanks for responding. I thought your blog said the Master recipe could be used. I had some dough in the frig and was having company, so thought I’d try these. Anyway, I have both your books and I’m looking forward to the Pizza & Flatbread book. I’ll try these rolls maybe with the challah dough next time. Oh, and the parchment paper problem has happened before with Fougasse and coffee cake – maybe I should spray the paper with Pam beforehand.

The rolls will have different textures depending on which dough you use. Have fun trying them with a variety of doughs.

What brand of parchment are you using? I have found that some brands tend to stick, you may want to experiment with a different kind next time. But in the meantime, you can cover the parchment with some flour, cornmeal or grease it, depending on the recipe.

I wanted a soft,tender roll so I made this with the buttermilk dough from ABin5. They turned out wonderfully soft and delicious! I baked them at 375 (I wasn’t exactly sure how to adjust the temp from the original — so I just turned it up 25 degrees from the buttermilk loaf recipe) and they didn’t brown. But I also forgot to brush the tops w/ olive oil, so maybe that’s why.
I kept wondering how they would be if I had brushed the insides w/ butter instead of olive oil — my mouth wanted butter 🙂

i have the original artisan bread book and i’m trying to find a recipe for rolls for thanksgiving (as my husband has decided that “we’re” adding rolls to the menu!) any recommendations for types of dough or techniques? i want to avoid butter/egg washes since my son has allergies so i’d love to do something like the pull-apart rolls but with just the master recipe? thoughts?

i was hoping to make something i could serve with roasted garlic so i wasn’t sure the sweeter doughs would work. i don’t really need them to be super soft, but i don’t want them to be too crisp, either! any ideas?

or, do you think olive oil dough would work for this? can i bake that like the pull-apart rolls in a square pan? which temp/time rules do i follow since the olive oil dough doesn’t have specific baking instructions?

The brioche dough in ABin5 is not that sweet, we use it for savory breads all the time. You can you it or the olive oil dough for a garlic bread. The brioche will be a softer bread. The challah would also be a good choice.

Had to try this recipe, since I’ve been making the rosemary olive oil bread from your book for awhile now. My rosemary plants are diminishing.
I made it last night, but being mindful of what Katharina and others said above, I dropped the oven temp to 450. They browned very quickly and were “done” about 9 minutes before the timer went off. Very crispy on the outside and soft as a baby’s butt on the inside. Wonderful! Now, I’m going to have to plant more rosemary…oh, well.

Oh! Those were worth making! I used butter instead of olive oil, buttered the baking sheet instead of parchment, and cooked them for 12 min. @ 425 degrees. My husband said they were the best crescent rolls ever. Now if I could just learn to roll out a circle…lol. Thanks for the continued inspirations.

Firts, I just got these out of the oven except with 3 or 4 chocolate chips instead of rosemay and the master recipe and they are finger-licking delicious, so thank you !!!

My round was about the same size as yours with 1lb of dough but much much thiner and my crescent ended up much thiner and much smaller. They were done cooking after about 10 minutes at 420. Maybe you meant 1 1/2 or even 2 lb of dough ? That might explain why so many people are burning/overcooking.

Your rolls sound fantastic. I will make a note on the recipe that some people are having them bake much faster. When you bake chocolate it is a good idea to do it at a lower temperature, but I am glad to hear they didn’t burn!

Hey Jeff and Zoe! Eva from the Netherlands here. Just started making my own kneading breads and also your breads a few weeks ago, and am in love with baking! Can’t imagine to buy store bread anymore. Just had a question; if i’m making the Artisan Bread Boules, everything goes alright and they turn out wonderfull. Making a pizza also worked. But today I wanted to make these Crescent rolls (from the master AB5), and I couldn’t handle the dough; it was just too sticky… (and this dough I used a few days ago for my pizza, and then it was just fine)… I really couldn’t roll it out and make crescent rolls out of it, so I just formed it into a baguette and hope this will turn out fine so no dough is ruined and lost. Do you have any idea why this happened? I used enough flour to dust it… I made the dough on saturday evening, and now it’s thursday, but I dont suppose this should make any difference? Please help this dutch bread baking student:) Love from Groningen, the Netherlands

Eva: as the dough ages, it gets wetter (due to accumulation of yeast by-products). So later in the batch’s life isn’t a great time to try fancy shapes. You could make a drier version when you know you’ll be doing crescents with longer-stored dough. Maybe a quarter-cup less water?

That’s a good idea! Thank you for your quick reply. Supose I’m going to make a new batch tonight and put it in the fridge overnight. So with a new batch it would be fine, I mean, without leaving out a quarter cup of water? Lets try again tomorrow!

I hope this works with the pumpernickel rye bread recipe. I want to duplicate the wonderful rye crescent rolls I had many years ago in Cincinnati. Once I saw your “any dough will work” comment, I thought, “Aha!!”
Now I’m living in the high desert, and it took me a year to figure out the adjustments for high-altitude baking, but I think I’ve got it now. I can’t wait to try some warm rye crescents. Wish me luck!

I’m not a fan of garlic powder, I’d use fresh roasted garlic. Recipes for that in any of our books. Mince it very fine and mix with the recipe’s liquids. The Parmesan sounds great, no adjustments neccesary for either of these.

I grew up with the local bakeries making rye rolls that were crescent shaped. They’re harder to find these days. Any advice on temperature, time and steam vs. no steam for this shape with your rye dough?

Thanks Jeff! I must have just missed your reply so I took a chance with about a pound of rye dough. I wish I could remember(!) but I’m pretty sure I did 425 with steam. The rolls were small (8 with the one pound dough) and we’re done in less than 15 minutes. They were delicious, but we would like them a little denser, and definitely chewier.

Oh, and I used 1/3 rye flour to 2/3 AP. I also added about 1/8 cup of gluten flour and 2 tablespoons canola oil.

These kinds of tweaks are outside my area of expertise, but probably not yours!

For a chewier bread, should I adjust the flour ratios, water, or temperature? I posted a photo on Twitter, and tagged @ArtisanBreadin5 if you care to see!

I’ll give that a try. I thought adding the gluten flour (vital wheat gluten) would do the trick but next time I’ll go with the bread flour. I think I remember reading that our (Canadian) flour is generally higher in protein anyway, but I’ll go back to the book for more details. Thank you again!!